


Teacher's Conferences and Family Trees

by gertiemcfuzz



Series: Subpoenas and Spousal Privilege [2]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-12
Updated: 2016-01-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 08:45:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5702269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gertiemcfuzz/pseuds/gertiemcfuzz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A lost scene from Subpoenas and Spousal Privilege. Cat drags Kara along to Carter's teacher conference.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Teacher's Conferences and Family Trees

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all, I apologize, I know a lot of you are waiting for an update on Autopilot, and I promise I am still working on it. The chapters are getting longer and I just want to make sure I do them justice. 
> 
> In the meantime, enjoy a lost piece of Subpoenas and Spousal Privilege.

**Nine Months and 16 Days**

Kara rubbed her hands on her pants again. This was never something she’d expected to be doing. She knew, of course, that this whole fake marriage thing would bring with it some challenges, but this particular one had never crossed her mind. She’d pictured herself here eventually, some years down the road, after she’d had some time to really settle into the role.

But this…she wasn’t a parent, not really. Just because she did some of the things that parents do didn’t mean that she was one. She made meals, and checked homework, and read Harry Potter before bed. She did drop-offs and pick-ups a few times a week, and she knew all of the character’s names in the new comic book that she’d stopped to pick up as a surprise after a hard day at school a month ago. And she loved him, she loved him deep into her bones in a way she wasn’t really ready to think about yet. But she wasn’t a parent.

So when Cat mentioned a week ago that Carter’s parent teacher conference was coming up, she didn’t think much of it beyond making sure that her boss’s schedule was clear that evening. In fact, it wasn’t until Carter himself told her how excited he was that she’d be meeting his teacher the night before, as they closed _Half-Blood Prince,_ that she’d realized the two Grants were expecting her to go.

She tried not to let her surprise show in front of Carter. Instead, she kissed his temple and pulled his blankets up to his chin, wishing him a good night and went to stand in his doorway waiting as Cat did the same, just like she did any other night.

It wasn’t until they had reached their own room that Kara finally spoke up. “I’m going with you to the parent teacher conference?” She asked timidly.

Cat, who’d been taking her jewelry off turned quickly and shot Kara an unamused look. “Were you not listening last week when I told you to put it in the schedule?”

“I…just thought you meant…your schedule…” Kara spoke the words slowly, not wanting to aggravate the other woman.

“Do not tell me that you’re unavailable.” Cat’s tone was becoming sharper the longer she spoke.

“No! No, of course I’m available, I just-I’m not-you!” Kara’s hands were fluttering helplessly around her, she took a breath to get herself back on track. “You’re his mom.” She finally said, hoping Cat understood.

“And you’re my wife, a sacrifice I selflessly made for you, I don’t see why attending one parent teacher conference is such an inconvenience in comparison. I do it twice a year, it’s hardly something to get this upset about.”

Kara sighed, this was not going how she planned. “It’s not an inconvenience.” She promised. “I just don’t want to overstep. _You’re_ his mom,” she reiterated. “Not to mention his father.”

“Please,” Cat waved her hand dismissively, going back to her previous task, “Nathan hasn’t bothered showing up to one of these since Carter was in preschool.” She didn’t appear all that upset with that information. After a moment she spoke again. “I am fully capable of going alone, but _Carter_ would be devastated if you didn’t join me.”

“Okay,” Kara agreed with a smile, “I just wanted to make sure you were okay with it.” She could tell by the tone of her voice that Cat cared about her attendance more than she let on.

///

The town car was just pulling up to the school’s entrance and Kara could feel her heartbeat speeding up a little. She felt ridiculous for being so nervous, Alex and Lucy both told her she was making a bigger deal out of it than what was necessary, and Cat kept giving her a look that clearly said she was about ready to shove her out of the car. There was just something about the whole thing that felt important, even though she knew it was fake, she wanted Carter’s teachers to like her, to respect the role she had in his life even if it wasn’t that of parent.

Cat was quickly checking her make-up one last time, wiping away a small lipstick smudge that was a direct result of her pursing her lips at Kara’s behavior, she rolled her eyes before placing the compact back into her purse just as the car parked. She didn’t bother waiting for the driver, opening her door herself and getting out, extending her hand to Kara to do the same.

“Darling.” To anybody else, her voice would sound sweet and loving but Kara knew it was a silent warning for her to pull herself together.

She took the offered hand and climbed out behind Cat, not letting go until they were checking in at the front table where she was handed a nametag that read:

Kara Grant

Carter Grant

Mrs. Liteman -7th Grade

 

She briefly wondered if Carter had intentionally given them her name wrong or if the school had just assumed she took Cat’s name when they married. Either way, the sight of it caused a small flutter in her stomach along with a small twinge of sadness knowing that it probably wouldn’t be much longer before Cat insisted that they’d accomplished their goal of throwing the DOJ off and could get divorced.

As they finished securing their nametags and walked away from the table, Kara once again reached for Cat’s hand, intertwining their fingers. Cat gave her a curious glance; it was rare for them to hold hands anywhere except in the darkness of their bedroom where they could both pretend it didn’t mean anything. Kara just gave a subtle nod to the people around them in response; people who had no way of knowing their union was anything but legitimate. Cat seemed to accept this and continued to pull Kara along toward Carter’s classroom.

They were third in line outside the door, moving to stand close to the wall not wanting to block the hallway from those moving toward other rooms. Kara removed her hand from Cat’s and placed it on the small of her back instead, absentmindedly running her nails up and down, over her dress, while they waited.

“This shouldn’t take long.” Cat spoke, breaking Kara from her daydreaming. “We’ll say our hellos, she’ll show us his report card and some of his work, tell us about what’s coming up in class, and gush like a fountain about how he rises far above the other children.”

Kara couldn’t help but smile, despite the glares being directed at them by the couple in front of them who surely thought Cat was being conceited.

Twenty minutes later, that same couple walked out looking very unhappy. Kara watched them cautiously as they made their way down the hallway, wondering if Cat had been lying about what was waiting ahead for them. Cat grabbed her hand and pulled her along into the classroom, where Mrs. Liteman was waiting for them.

“Don’t worry darling, I’ve met their son before, horrid little monster.” Cat told her, apparently not minding that Carter’s teacher could hear everything. “This will be much more pleasant for us.”

“As always, it’s a pleasure Mrs. Grant.” Carter’s teacher said with a laugh.

Kara shot her an apologetic look, as she took the teacher’s offered hand.

“You must be Kara, I’m so glad to finally be able to put a face to the name.” She smiled warmly, and Kara was immediately put at ease. “And your wife is right, Jason is…not Carter.” She said diplomatically, while gesturing for them to take a seat.

“Well apparently Jackson’s parents were unhappy with more than just his academic performance.” Cat noted as she turned around to find the chairs were a good three feet apart.

Kara grabbed the one closest to her and pulled it towards Cat’s, looking mortified at the running commentary Cat was providing. Luckily, Mrs. Liteman seemed more amused than anything else.

Once they were seated, she pulled out a green folder with Carter’s name on it, flipping it open and grabbing the paper from the top, she turned it toward them so they could see.

“Carter is doing really wonderfully, not that that should come as a surprise, his grades are the highest in his class, in fact the biggest issue we face in terms of his academics is making sure he is continually challenged.” She ran her pen down the sheet, circling each A+ she passed.

“Cat, as you and I had discussed at the beginning of the year, Carter has two periods throughout the day where he moves to the high school wing for his classes, we’ve also taken the liberty to reach out to the local university to see if it’d be possible to do some sort of dual enrollment next year, which is looking promising.

“The rest of his classes are running just as smoothly. He does tend to get through his work faster than other students so we’ve been working on creating some independent study opportunities for him, at the moment, we’ve been grading those as extra credit. In the coming month, we’re hoping to put together a way to allow him to use the extra time as a free period. He’s expressed an interest in tutoring other students, so we’ve considered blocking that into his schedule.”

“He wants to work with other students?” Cat asked genuinely surprised.

Mrs. Liteman smiled, “Yes, he has really started to blossom socially this year. He’s been initiating interactions with his peers more often and is actively engaging in class discussions without being asked. Kelly has made some notes…” She dug around in the folder again, pulling out a stapled piece of paper and handed it across to them. Cat took it with one hand, resting the other on Kara’s thigh and leaning in close so they could both see.

“Kara could you-” Before she even finished the sentence, Kara was handing her a pair of reading glasses that she’d stashed in her purse before leaving the penthouse. “Thank you darling.” She spoke the words softly, taking just a moment to study Kara’s face before turning back to the papers in her hand.

It was something that had been happening more and more lately. She was used to, and fully expected, Kara anticipating her needs at the office, but recently she’d gotten just as good at doing so outside of the office as well. It was one of the many things that made it harder and harder for Cat to convince herself that she was being put out by this whole charade of a marriage.

As she slipped her glasses on, Mrs. Liteman continued. “Obviously Kelly goes into more detail but we’ve all been excited to see such growth in Carter since the school year started; he hasn’t been relying on Kelly as much as he has in years past, which is really very wonderful.”

Kara had met Kelly a handful of times. She was an interventionalist who worked specifically with Carter to bridge some of the social gaps to help him with his peer interaction.

“Well, we cannot go out anywhere without Kara stopping to talk to at least ten people on the street, so I suppose he was bound to start picking it up.” Cat commented with a roll of her eyes, but Kara knew it was her own way of acknowledging the changes in Carter recently and the role she had in it.

“You tease, but we got a big story out of that guy at the farmer’s market last month.” Kara pointed out, hoping her tone conveyed that she understood the true meaning of Cat’s previous statement.

“Hmm.” She just hummed, returning her focus to the papers in her hand.

After a short moment, Mrs. Liteman spoke up again, “Would you like to see what Carter has been working on?” She asked, not waiting for a reply before fishing the last of the papers out of the green folder and handing them to Kara since Cat still held the note from Kelly.

“On the top are some graded projects that he finished before fall break. The blueprints for the science project are really quite impressive, he said he had help from your sister.” She told them, looking to Kara.

She remembered Alex spending almost a full weekend at the penthouse a little over a month ago. Carter wanted her help designing a new kind of internal combustion engine that would recycle and purify the fuel it used. They called it the Breathing Dragon, not yet functional but Alex insisted that if they kept working it could actually be marketable.

“Under that, there’s a project that we’re currently working on. It’s a family tree, a little juvenile for Carter’s purposes but we’ve been trying to encourage them to be thinking about the diversities that exist between them as a class.”

Kara shuffled the papers in her hands until she found the family tree Carter had been working on. She couldn’t help the small gasp that left her when she took in paper.

On the very top was Carter’s name and a cartoonish drawing of himself. Under that he had a line connecting him to his parents, his father, Nathan, on the far left with a list of extended family underneath. Then, in the middle was Cat, her own parents, as well as some of her aunts and uncles, listed under her. Finally, on the right hand side, with a line connecting her to Cat, was Kara with Eliza, Jeramiah, and Alex listed underneath her. Her index finger traced her own name, and she felt that familiar ache in her bones again, that love she felt for him making if feel like all of her synapses were firing off at once.

It wasn’t until she felt Cat remove her hand from where it’d been resting on her thigh that she pulled her gaze away, suddenly panicking that she’d somehow overstepped, and that Cat was going to get angry that Carter had included her on his pedigree.

Instead she used her now free hand to tap the page, “Those art lessons you insisted on are really paying off, he has completely captured your puppy-dog look.” She said, pointing out the caricature of Kara that sat next to her name.

Kara smiled, a blush creeping up her face and neck, happy to see that Cat wasn’t offended, actually seeming more intrigued by her son’s artistic ability than anything else.

“Well, that’s all I have for you. Do you have any questions for me?” Mrs. Liteman asked, drawing their attention back to her.

After a few minutes of fielding Cat’s inquiries, Mrs. Liteman was shaking their hands once more and wishing them a good evening.

As they walked down the steps at the entrance of the building, Kara let out a deep breath.

“I told you that’d be quick and painless.”

“Only because Carter is amazing. I’m sure if we were here for Jason, I’d have been justified in the anxiety.” Kara replied.

“Who the hell is Jason?” Cat asked with irritated confusion.

“He’s – ya know, his parents…nevermind.” Kara brushed it off.

Cat shook her head at her, looking down to her watch. “We still have an hour and a half with the babysitter, do you want to stop for dinner on the way back?” She asked, already thinking of the steakhouse on 5th that served the special hand-cut fries she knew Kara liked.

“Oh, actually, I wondered…” Kara paused nervously, “maybe we could pick up a pizza? I thought I might help Carter fill in the rest of that family tree.” Her eyes were mostly directed at her feet, glancing up every few seconds to watch Cat’s face.

“Hmm…I suppose we could do pizza, but only if you two eat extra greens tomorrow. Don’t think I haven’t noticed his growing appetite for junk food.” She warned.

Kara laughed lightly, “Of course Miss Grant.”

Unsurprisingly, Carter received an A+ on his project. It hung on the refrigerator at the penthouse for two weeks until it suddenly disappeared. Cat assumed it had fallen and slipped under the fridge. She kept reminding herself to ask Kara to retrieve it, until a few days later when she’d stopped at Kara’s desk to grab a new pad of sticky notes.

As she opened the top drawer, she found Carter’s project sitting right on top, his father’s portion folded back so only Kara’s and her own are visible. Her thumb swiped over the caricature of Kara once more before she placed it back in the desk where she found it, walking back to her office.

Fifteen minutes later she’s hollering from behind her desk for Kara to bring her the forgotten sticky notes.

**Author's Note:**

> So I just really loved writing Subpeonas and Spousal Privledge and wasn't ready to give up that universe with just one fic so I decided I'll randomly be adding little snip-bits here and there that'll be part of that world. If you have anything you want to see, let me know :)


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